


Gentle Sin

by BerlinKabarett



Series: No Sweeter Innocence than This [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Catholic Guilt, Closeted Character, Flashbacks, Gen, Hurt Steve Rogers, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, Religious Guilt, Steve Rogers Feels, Steve Rogers-centric, Stucky - Freeform, inner turmoil
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-10
Updated: 2016-10-09
Packaged: 2018-08-20 12:57:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8249905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BerlinKabarett/pseuds/BerlinKabarett
Summary: Steve Rogers casts his mind back to his youth living in Brooklyn, a battle in his heart between his catholic faith and his growing love for his best friend.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Hello. This is tied to another fic I have which takes place post-Civil War. I wanted to explore the conflict that a good Catholic boy must have felt in the first half of the 20th century if he felt something more than friendship for another man, whilst at the same time exploring the foundations of Steve/Bucky, which will most assuredly happen.

_"Hail Mary, full of grace.."_

  
The words of the prayer left his lips almost unconsciously, whispered against his chilly, clasped hands as they rested on the back of the pew in front, bony knees aching on the dusty floorboards. He finished the prayer for perhaps the fourth or fifth time, eyes occasionally lifting to the devotional effigy of the Virgin presiding over the altar. He stood slowly, gripping the pew and hearing the crack of his knees as he rose, genuflecting and crossing himself as he stepped out into the nave. His head hung as he stuffed his cold hands into the pockets of his thin jacket, his heels echoing up to the church rafters as he made his way out into the thin morning sun. His heart felt as burdened as when he had arrived.

A few times, he had considered bringing up his burden during confession. But try as he might, he had been so far unable to broach the subject with Father Duncan, the parish priest, who had baptised him as a baby as he had most of the parish and knew him as well as his own ma did.

  
The guilt would eat at the back of his thoughts unless he occupied himself, which he did more often than not, given his recent coming of age and the meagre living conditions that was the lot of most residents of Red Hook. They got by, but they worked hard. He was fond of sketching, and was skilled enough to sell the odd portrait. Since his mother started getting sick, his mind had been working overtime trying to work out ways to help keep their small family afloat. Stressful as it all was, in some small way he was grateful for the distraction from the guilt that burned at the back of his mind.

  
When his ma finally lost the fight, he had never felt more alone. He had no other family to turn to. His father had died before he had even been born, lost to a mustard gas attack back in the Great War. There was only one person who had always been there, like a candle in the dark during his time of despair, even though he'd tried to push himself away. His childhood friend, neighbour, and the very root cause of the guilt that drove him to the church of the Veneration to shiver on his knees and beg for forgiveness and deliverance for the unnatural stirrings in his heart.

  
And now, his knees still ached from the cold and the hard wooden floor even as he made his way up the steps to the small, spartan apartment that now housed only himself. His cold hands shook slightly as he lined his key up to the rusted keyhole, and something just seemed to break inside him. He clenched his fists and pressed his brow to the cracked paint of the door, eyes squeezing closed as tears burned them. The cold air always made his chest tight in the winter, and when he finally let out a sob it was more a wheeze. His heart hammered in his chest and all he could think, his mind screaming, was _'why, God? Why? Why? God, why_?'

  
"Steve, you okay, pal?"

  
Steve's eyes opened, snapping out of his reverie. He sat up on his bunk, taking a deep breath as he shook himself free of the memories from a darker time in his life. "I'm fine, Buck, why you ask?" he answered with a soft sigh.

  
"Thought you were cryin'."

  
Steve smiled at that, instantly making to brush off the remark, make a joke about it. But then he felt the wetness running from his eye and down his cheek. His brow creased and he lifted a large, warm hand, brushing it quickly away. "Hah, nah. I think it's the smoke, getting into the tent. That'd be somethin', though, huh? Captain America sniffling like a little girl."

  
Bucky returned the smile, hands cleaning his BA rifle with an oiled chamois. His eyes, however, betrayed some concern, though he joined Steve in laughing it off. "Yeah, don't think your comic books'd sell so well if you were hollering in 'em."

  
He snorted at his friend, leaning back again to resume his position lying on the bunk, hands beneath his head. He listened to the metallic clanking of Bucky sliding the cleaned and oiled parts of his rifle back together, whistling an old tune through his teeth, the crackle of the camp fire outside the tent a comforting background noise. He snatched a glimpse at his friend as he occupied himself with his rifle, his stomach turning over on itself as his memories and guilt resumed their parade through his mind. Even after the serum and the fame and the horrors of war, his heart was assaulted on two fronts of its own.

  
He cared for Bucky deeply, as a true friend should. But that was not the end of it. Since their teens, Steve had found himself slowly realising that the love he felt for Bucky went beyond the love of friendship into something... abnormal. Something against the law. Something sinful.

  
How many hours had he spent at the church in Red Hook, berating himself, hating himself, begging the Blessed Virgin for forgiveness and for a way to cure himself of the sickness. He knew full well what the bible said, and the law. It was degenerate, immoral, sick and disgusting. Before the serum, he had figured it just to be another of his genetic defects. He was sick in the head as well as bodily. One of his greatest hopes as he had awaited Erskine's procedure had been that this unnatural longing for his best friend would be one of the ailments purged from him, and for a while afterwards he had convinced himself that was the case. Peggy had been a source of great happiness for him for many reasons, and though they had not so much as gone out on a date, he knew that he cared for her.

  
But that night, when they'd crossed enemy lines into the Hydra compound and he had seen his face again, had seen that Bucky was alive and safe, _safe_ , when he looked into his familiar stormy blue eyes, his heart soared and then plummeted after he realised that even after so long apart, after so much had changed, after the world had turned on its head for Steve, _he still loved this man with his every breath._

  
After that, with so much at stake and the war raging on, Steve had pushed his own selfish fears to the very back of his mind. Since it seemed that part of him would remain incurable, the only thing he could do was sit on it and accept that he was destined for hell when his time came. He would never act on his feelings, because not only would that exacerbate his punishment but he would never risk Bucky feeling disgust or hatred for him. Somehow, the thought of those eyes turning on him in hatred was worse than the prospect of hell.

  
Once or twice, Steve was sure that the Devil put little whispers in his mind.

  
_What if he feels the same?_

  
Only little whispers, yes, but Steve had stamped them out with abject horror. It was wrong.

  
But when the whispers became images, flashes in his mind of Bucky embracing him and holding him like lovers did, he was plagued by desire and self-disgust. Scenarios played out in his mind of Bucky whispering a secret into his ear, I love you, too, and those warm hands that had held him close in his times of illness and anguish moving over the new muscular broadness of his back, sliding, touching, caressing him. He imagined them with fewer clothes. It came to a head at last when Steve feverishly pleasured himself during a shower at camp, whimpering Bucky's name softly as his guilty tears washed away with the water. He was damned.

  
Then, one terrible day, Bucky fell.

  
It was more than Steve could bear. As much as he hated himself for loving the man, his loss cut him more keenly than any pain he could remember. Surely, God, this is my punishment, he thought. I would rather be in hell.

  
After the loss of Bucky, Steve seemed to care about his own wellbeing less and less, trying and failing to drink himself into a stupor, taking stupid risks in the field, testing the extent of his new abilities to the admonishing of Peggy and his teammates. He fell into a self-destructive spiral that finally ended when he crashed the plane into the ice. As the freezing water flooded the cockpit and he felt his consciousness fading, he wondered vaguely if God would accept his sacrifice and admit him into heaven, where he could reunite with Bucky.

  
Fast-forward seventy years, and Steve Rogers found himself in a whole new world. At first, his exposure to the twenty-first century was limited for the sake of his own sanity. He learned about major global events, advances in technology, and eventually sociological advances. He learned about the emancipation of ethnic minorities, the civil rights movement, about the waves of feminism, and most astonishing for him, the acceptance of homosexuality.

  


"You're kidding, right? They don't throw 'em in jail any more?" he had asked incredulously of his new teammate Natasha.

  
"Nope. You can even marry someone of the same sex now. New York was the first state to make it legal."

  
Steve's mind was swimming at this information. Two men, or two women, being able to legally marry in the old church in Red Hook where he had wept and prayed for having a crush on his best friend as a teenager. "That's crazy."

  
"I know it's a lot to get used to, Cap. Don't worry, you'll get there."

  
Steve had offered a grim smile in response. Maybe if he'd been born to this generation he'd have felt differently about his urges growing up. Either way, it was too late for him.


End file.
